Day 2: Sunday, September 18, 2011 (10am-5pm)
Arrived at my internship “dressed up,” ready for the day… I then noticed that everyone was wearing jeans, t-shirts, very casual clothing…just great. Here I am: the eager intern. Luckily, I had thrown a change of clothes and sneakers into my car at the last minute (out of unnecessary preparedness… something I would recommend all interns to get used to… always have a change of clothes, always have an easy lunch (one that you can scarf down in between assignments), and always have a full tank of gas.

Jesse, the sales counselor I was to be working with today, told me to get changed and we would head over to Music Fest! He briefed me on what I needed to know in order to properly tell any potential clients about the fitness center. We loaded up the car and as I got into the
front seat he told me he really was not sure how to get there…

We made it without too much excitement. As we set up our table with fun giveaways and our “wheel” (I’ll explain in a few), Jesse started networking with the surrounding vendors—getting the general vibe of the area. It was actually pretty impressive to watch him “work.” We had a big “spin-the-wheel-win-a-prize-(but-only-if-you-give-us-your-contact-information)” set up which attracted quite a number of people! The day started out slowly, picked up gradually, but by the end we had gotten several pages of leads.

Throughout the day I interacted with the people milling about the festival. I described the fitness center’s amenities and handed out information and prizes such as water bottles, t-shirts, pens, etc. My experience of the day, however, was when a lady came up to me and started describing some gym that was being built near our facility, and asked me to explain the difference between our gym and their gym. Well! I thought this would be easy. Even though I don’t know the area, I figured I could simply explain that I didn’t know what the other gym offered… but here is what we offer… and this is why we are different from ALL other gyms. She would not hear of it! She went off in a huff, complaining to her friend that I was not answering a question and justifying her complaint. Sometimes people are just plain difficult to talk to! Hopefully I can learn from this experience, keep my cool, and do better next Sunday when we head over to a Fall festival!

… the next few hours I got to enjoy the sights, sounds, and smells of
Westfield, NJ’s FESTI-FALL! I managed a “booth” all day. People love…
and I do mean, LOVE, free stuff! We had a prize wheel set up to draw in
the kids (and their parents). We also offered them a chance to win a
free month of fitness, all they have to do is put their information
down, and we will call if they win the raffle. And BAM! We have leads.
Lead generation is vital to marketing a fitness center… hmm, lead
generation is vital to marketing. The Festi-Fall promotion was
basically to get the word out about the center. Whenever we met current
members, we would try to get feedback on how they like the facilities
and what we offer, etc. The usual response was, “oh we love it!” Some
non-members, who had already heard about us, usually went with “it’s too
expensive.” One of the ways to dispel that negative image is to show
that the services we offer are worth the little extra price. Our
facilities are state-of-the-art, and our personal trainers are the best,
our classes and amenities are unlike any other gym. If you value our
service, you will not mind paying extra.